


maybe (you're going to be the one that saves me)

by sunbean72



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Cliche, F/M, Gen, Hope you enjoy, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, Protective Peter Parker, Protective Tony Stark, Whump, collapsed building trope, why yes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-10
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24350266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunbean72/pseuds/sunbean72
Summary: working hard on the next chapter of redwing (and even heartsick!!) but my muse was pounding on the closet door where she'd been banished for her rudeness to insist I write a whumpy iron!dad spider!son mutual respect and protection fic. I’ve done bombs and collapsed buildings before, nothing life changing here, it’s just a favorite trope of mine.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 13
Kudos: 56





	maybe (you're going to be the one that saves me)

One moment, Tony Stark was laughing and charming the heck out of the Mexican delegate to the United Nations Public Order subcommittee and the next, he grasped the delegate roughly by her arm, hard enough to bruise, to injure, shoving her harshly to the ground, throwing himself on top of her.

It was all he had time to do in the split second he glanced over at Peter to see how far he'd wandered off, see the fearful confusion on his face, follow his gaze to the ice sculpture a few yards away from Tony, and see the timer click down to three zeroes.

...

Peter's finely tuned senses experienced everything as if it were happening at one-tenth the speed. Plenty of time.

Plenty of time to see Mr. Stark's gaze where it landed on the ice sculpture. Plenty of time, now, to understand the source of what had been wreaking havoc with his spidey-senses-- the small but powerful bomb hidden artfully in the floral arrangement beneath the melting sculpture of the Avenger's "A" carved intricately in ice. _Plenty_ of time to hear the soft click of the detonator. 

All the time in the world to feel the brush of air that was the fore-shock, the air being pushed forward with unfathomable speed before the bomb's wave of destruction hit. He could even feel the pressure in his eardrums change, causing a bright pain in his ears. Plenty of time to feel the caress of heat as the wave of air brushed by him. With the heat came the shrapnel, though he was far enough to be outside the worst of the blast radius. Still, there was little he could do to entirely avoid the super-heated, super-fast chunks of flaming death hurling toward him.

But plenty of time to turn and allow the force of the explosion to push him under a table that was against the wall, feeling the chunks graze him like bullets flying by. He hit the wall with an unpleasant _crack_ and then everything was all at once and he lost the thread of it with the rupture of pain in his head as it, too, hit the wall and there was too much for him to hear, to smell, to taste, to see, to feel and so he felt all of it as nothing, a giant static. Except the pain. He felt that. Head. Chest. Face. Arm. 

Hurt.

The pain in his chest became immediate and demanding-- he couldn't breathe. He tried to gasp for air but his lungs simply did not cooperate and for a panicked moment, he knew he was suffocating, knew he would die of asphyxiation. It was terrifying and he couldn't even cry in fear but soon he was able to take a small breath, then a deeper, painful one, only to start coughing immediately as the air was filled with dust and debris. 

He'd had the wind knocked out of him. 

Huh. 

He hadn't realized Spider-man had that particular vulnerability. For all the times he'd fallen and landed hard, this was the first and hopefully the last time that had happened to him. 

His entire focus was on trying to get air into his non-complying lungs, which would insist on making things more difficult than they needed to be. His head swam against darkness both internal and external, his ears ringing with a sharp and unpleasant high pitch tone and a wave of vertigo and dizziness that made the room swim and spin and swerve and tilt. With just enough presence of mind left to recognize some of the symptoms were temporary, Peter collapsed on the ground, staring at the dim outline of the underside of the table. His vision seemed unaffected; even in the sudden and apparently complete darkness, he could make out the piece of gum someone had once stuck there. 

He coughed, his ribs screaming in agony of protest. 

Wait.

Just wait a minute.

He'd just been in an explosion. So had the other four people in the room, including Mr. Stark.

He tried to listen to hear if there was anyone moving, anyone left alive aside from him. Whether he couldn't hear yet or there was nothing _to_ hear was impossible to say. He tried to sit up.

The room tilted alarmingly and Peter wisely decided it may not quite be time for the sitting of the up just yet. No, laying flat on his back was perfectly acceptable, with the lessening of the barfing up of all the fine hors d'oeuvres he'd indulged in only a few minutes ago. Best to just chill here a sec.

It was very still.

This wasn't his first rodeo, he reminded himself, although one rodeo hardly seemed like enough experience to really make much of a difference and anyway how many rodeos did you really need to attend before you were an expert? He was nowhere near that number, probably. Who had come up with the rodeo saying anyway?

His second collapsed building had already gone much better than the first, however; that was good. It was good he wasn't pinned down by hundreds of tons of debris. 

Plenty of time to appreciate not being squished like the bug he'd named himself after. Plenty of time. 

Finally he rolled onto his side, sitting up much more judiciously this time. Slowly. Nothing moved in the darkness and Peter fought a wave of terror and panic that he was buried alive. Stubbornly he waited for his eyes to adjust and forced his fear into a little compartment where he could deal with it (probably soon, it would probably have to be soon). At the moment, he forced himself to focus on finding out if anyone else at survived.

His heart pounded in his head and ears, compounding the pain with each throb. It looked unlikely. Unlikely that anyone else had survived. "Mr. Stark!" he croaked, his voice strangled in the closed and dusty air and against his tight throat. He fished out his phone from his pocket, sliding the battery to power save mode. No service. He flicked the flashlight on.

Immediately he saw two people, one of them clearly dead. The other, a man, Peter picked his way over debris and rubble. He felt for a pulse; tried to attune his senses to hear a heartbeat but his ears were ringing and still felt plugged. Peter shook the man's shoulder, not trusting that he couldn't feel the pulse, maybe he was just doing it wrong--

The man's eyes opened briefly. "What happened?"

"I think there was a bomb. Are you all right sir?"

The man tried to focus but seemed really out of it. "My wife," he mumbled. Peter swallowed, glancing at the other body. "I... I'm sorry sir, if your wife was wearing a blue dress... she didn't make it."

"Elizabeth," the man said brokenly, his face crumpling with grief. "No, no, no, she can't be--"

"Easy!" Peter said, not sure what to do to ease the man's grief. He was bleeding badly from a head wound, looked like he'd need stitches, and his leg looked broken. 

"My mom is going to kill me," the man said, closing his eyes. "She's been watching the news and saw the protesters, said it wouldn't be safe. I told her there was no safer place in the world than the same building as Tony Stark." Peter swallowed thickly, a stab of anxiety going through him at the mention of his mentor. He would like nothing better than to go start moving the concrete that was between him and where he'd last seen Tony Stark standing, but he didn't want to leave this guy alone yet.

"We're going to get you out of here," Peter promised. "Do you have a cell phone? Maybe you can get a signal, mine can't."

The man didn't move for a moment. He opened his eyes again, filled with fresh fear. Tears of pain and fear leaked from the man's eyes, making a trail in the dust caked on his face. "I can't move. My arms, my legs, I can't move them."

Peter caught his breath then moved his flashlight over the man's body in a more careful look for a wound. Just as he saw a large, dark puddle forming under the man, he smelled it; blood. Lots of blood. Lots. It was growing before his eyes. 

"Wh-what's your name, sir?"

"Jacob Warner."

"Jacob, I'm going to stay with you, sir, I'll stay with you until help gets here. You're pretty badly injured so we have to keep you still."

"'s your name, kid?"

"Peter."

"Peter," he said, his eye lids fluttering, the word slipping into a mumble. "Can you grab my hand? I can't feel it. My mom is going to be so mad at me. She told me not to come."

Peter grabbed his hand tightly, holding it to his chest so Jacob could see he was holding it. "We'll call her together when we get out of here. She'll forgive you, I know she will."

"Please hold my hand, Peter, I can't feel it, hold it tighter. Elizabeth?" His eyes closed and his head dropped to the side, slack. Peter prayed the man had just gone unconscious and tried to rouse him but it quickly became all too clear the man was dead. Peter had limited experience with dead bodies; the sickened sadness and fear that filled him were unfamiliar, frightening in their own right. It felt wrong to leave him there like this, alone in the dark and ruin, but he was beyond Peter's help now. 

He flicked off the flashlight, allowing his eyes to adjust to the darkness. The bomb had apparently knocked down a pillar that was holding a support beam; a lot of the ceiling had collapsed. He went to the wall of debris and started carefully moving them, trying not to cause a worse collapse. Even with care, a few times things shifted, terrifying him that he would further bury himself and any other survivors. He _prayed_ there were survivors, selfishly, at least one. He couldn't lose Mr. Stark, they had become friends in the past few weeks, and he was afraid. 

...

Tony automatically tried to sit up as he came to, multiple sources of pain blossoming across his body. But he couldn't move much; he was pinned down. Dim light was provided by multiple smoldering fires, adding to the pollution and detritus in the air. Each breath drew in particulates that wracked his injured body with uncontrolled coughing until he was able to fumble for the handkerchief in his suit jacket pocket. Wrapping it over his mouth and nose for a few minutes helped him to finally breathe. He became aware of a sharp pain on the top of his head and he managed to pull his left arm free of the rubble on top of it and felt for the injury. It felt like a nasty gash, several inches long, clumping the dust and blood in his hair. He didn't need FRIDAY to tell him he had a concussion; he was familiar with the sensation.

He felt for his phone, his connection to FRIDAY and to help, but it was smashed. He hadn't brought Iron Man gear, instead electing to bring a security detail which he had just sent to clear their exit after nearly everyone else had left the function. It was a charity meet-and-greet where UN Accords countries were hosting local high schoolers as a cultural exchange and good-will PR move. There had been hot spots of protest erupting around the country once the Accords were officially ratified. A small but vocal subset of the population thought it was infringing on America's civil liberties to have other countries interfere with their heroes, and they saw Iron Man as a sell-out and traitor. This was supposed to be good press.

Whoever had done this wasn't going for mass death. The high schoolers had left more than an hour ago and there were only a few people straggling in the ball room. Most of the rest of the building had been cleared for security purposes when the event started and only a hand full of employees were around in the kitchen area to start cleaning up once all the guests were gone. No, this was specific. This was targeted. It was personal. Tony regretted that he’d offered Peter a ride home instead of the bus the other kids had been in, he’d only placed him in danger.

Tony groaned again as pain erupted as more injuries started to push past the initial shock. He was laying on something, very uncomfortable. Pinned as he was, he could hardly turn but he twisted as much as he could he saw he was laying across the Mexican delegate's legs. Her eyes were open with obvious multiple traumas, most notibly a large piece of shrapnel from the bomb in her neck. Tony shuddered, a stab of terrible sadness; he'd liked the woman, she had been sharp as a tack, friendly, intelligent. They'd had some good ideas for some joint projects that would help clean up some of the drug cartels' intractable hold on parts of the country. All that goodness, kindness, potential, gone in a second. Tony supposed it could have been her they were after. It was a damn shame, he'd almost saved her but he just wasn't fast enough. 

His mind went to Peter, on the other side of a mass of debris if he was still alive. He struggled to push against the large chunks of concrete and rubble, but he couldn't get an angle. 

"Peter!" he called hoarsely. "Peter Parker!" His voice was dull and could not seem to breach the enclosed space around him. He didn't usually have a problem with tight spots, he lived in the Iron Man suit after all, but he knew that since Peter's encounter with the Vulture he _did._ It kept flashing through his mind, the moment when Peter caught his gaze, worried, afraid. Adrenaline, already coursing through his veins, kicked up even higher as his stress levels rose.

Minutes ticked by and the temperature rose from the smoldering fires and oxygen started to deplete. Tony looked for anything to try and leverage the cement off him but he couldn't even see anything, let alone reach it. He tried again and again to call for Peter, listening to the dull silence as his only answer. The discomfort on his back increased; there was some damage. The way he'd turned, his entire right side had caught heat and shrapnel, no way to tell how bad except by the pain. 

He pushed at the block, trying to move it a few inches at a time, but it wouldn't budge and intense pain flared in the right side of his abdomen. At his latest attempt, some rubble had shifted, a pile collapsing dangerously close to him, kicking up more dust in the smokey air.

"Do you need a hand with that, sir?" a voice asked innocently. "Or you good?"

"Parker," Tony said, catching sight of the teenager in the dusty, smokey air. He blinked rapidly, trying to dispel the tears of relief that flooded his eyes and he reached out and Peter grasped his hand.

"I'm right here, sir.”"

“You hurt? What injuries do you have, you bleeding?” Peter shook his head.

“Minor injuries, Mr. Stark, this isn’t my blood. I’m going to help you out from under this stuff now, don’t worry.”

"I'm not worried now you're here, kid," he said faintly, allowing himself a moment to relax against the pain and fear he'd been fighting, fighting. He'd only meant that his biggest worry was that something had happened to Parker, that he was wounded or killed, but when Peter started to pull his hand away Tony couldn't help but give it one last squeeze, realizing and hopefully communicating that he knew Peter was a hero. That things would be better not just because he was safe but because he was _there_. Things were better and safer because he was there.

The heavy concrete was nothing to Peter's strength and it tossed it away like a paper plate, quickly removing some of the smaller but still heavy-by-normal-standards debris. Tony attempted to sit up but was brought up short.

"Uh oh," Peter said quietly, kneeling beside him. 

"What's 'uh oh?'" Tony groaned against the pain.

"Don't take this the wrong way but you appear to be slightly perforated, sir." Peter bit his lip. "Sorry, Mr. Stark, I kind of deal with stressful situations by making jokes, I can stop."

"Is that what that was? It's okay, Peter, whatever you need to do. Perforated. Good one. Forgive me for not laughing, just a little bit painful at the moment." Tony coughed out the words, pain stealing his breath, still struggling to breathe in the clouded atmosphere.

"Mr. Stark this is very not good. You're bleeding pretty bad. You're not only perforated, you're possibly impaled..." Tony, sweating and sick with pain and injuries, glanced up at the tone in Peter's voice. The kid was obviously scared to death, slick with sweat and covered in dust, shaking and ghost-white pale. The fear in his eyes shocked Tony out of some of his pain.

"I've been in worse spots, Pete," Tony said, panting a bit. "We'll get through this."

"That man that was by me, Jacob Warner, he died, and his wife, and that woman you were talking to. What if you die too?" Peter's voice was shaking. Tony sighed; Peter Parker was a bundle of courage and strength and general awesomeness, but he was just a kid. Death and destruction were a lot to bear for a friendly neighborhood hero. Tony dug a little deeper within himself to find his own strength to share with Peter while he could. 

"All right, pop-quiz, Hotshot," he said, his voice tight. "You're in a blown-up building that might still collapse. You can't make contact with rescue teams yet, you have a man down. What do you do?" 

"Throw up, possibly, apparently," Peter said, his voice still shaky. But he attempted a small smile.

"I guess we'll call that step one. What's step two?"

"I g-guess stabilize my teammate. Right Mr. Stark?"

"Yeah, that's real good thinking, but gotta watch out for any environmental dangers, right? These fires might hit something more combustible _and_ they're sucking up our oh'two. Right? Step two, put out the flames, okay?"

"Yes, sir," Peter said, moving away to comply with the advice. Tony was thankful for the distraction it provided Peter because he wasn't sure how serious things actually were here; shock could cover a multitude of injuries, he knew from experience. Carefully he raised his head up, bracing himself against the pain that tore through him at the movement. Multiple superficial lacerations that were bleeding and painful but not serious. But there were two wounds that _were_ a concern: the impalement Peter had noticed, a piece of rebar sticking out of his right lower abdomen. It had come from the column close to the bomb, probably. There was also a wound in his thigh he’d thought was itchy but turned out was definitely bleeding a lot more blood than was generally considered acceptable from a gouge created by shrapnel possibly still in his leg. He laid back, breathing hard against the pain and worry that filled him.

 _Handle it, Stark,_ he told himself sternly. He’d told Peter he’d been in worse situations that this, but this might be in the top three somewhere. The Ballroom was downstairs, underground. They had purposefully chosen it for it’s lack of outside access due to several threats against the gathering and Tony in particular. Now that would work against them as there were fewer ways for rescuers to get to them, too, but he knew they’d be working on it. The Iron Legion would already be deployed to help if FRIDAY had time to register the threat before his phone was smashed, but there was no telling. Even the Iron Legion would have to be careful not to further the collapse of the building since the bomb took out a support beam.

By the time Peter was back, the darkness more complete now, Tony had calmed down. “Okay Peter, I’m going to need your help,” he said evenly. “First, it’s really uncomfortable laying on this lady’s legs, so help me move over. Turn your phone flashlight on so we can see a minute.”

Peter wordlessly complied and Tony found himself as easily handled as the concrete. He sometimes forgot how powerful Peter was; he could probably take Cap in a fist fight, if fist-fighting were something Spider-man would ever do, which it wasn’t. Pain spiked around the rebar in his abdomen and his leg, angry and white and red.

“Sorry, sir!” Peter said anxiously.

“Okay, listen. No need to apologize, all right? I need you to focus, because unless we hurry I might bleed out. Take off your belt, we’re going to use it as a tourniquet. First, use your camera light to see if you can see if anything is in the wound, can you do that?”

Peter was already moving to do what he asked, taking off his belt and then shining his light. “That looks bad,” Peter commented faintly.

“Feels bad too, but it will heal. Hold her handkerchief over your mouth when you can,” he added when Peter was coughing. “Did you see anything in the wound?”

“There’s a piece of something in there, I can’t tell what, should I try and take it out? There’s so much blood!”

“Right, I think it nicked an artery, so stay focused.” Due to the rebar in his abdomen, he couldn’t sit up to see things for himself. “Take off your jacket, you’re going to pull out that chunk you see then apply direct pressure, hard, okay? Tourniquet first.”

Tony bit back a scream of pain when Peter moved his leg to put the belt under it and Peter bit back an apology, gritting his teeth.

“Tighter,” Tony said and Peter made the adjustment, his hands slick with Tony’s blood. “Good. Really good. Okay, I’m sorry Pete, hate to do it to you, but you got this. Listen, if I pass out, you gotta leave me and get help, okay? Can you do it?”

“I don’t want to leave you, Mr. Stark,” Peter said, his brown eyes pleading. “I don’t want you to be here alone.” _Die alone,_ they both knew he worried about. 

“I need a doctor, Peter, and you getting out of here is going to help me get that. Like I said, I’ve been in worse spots, it’s okay. Okay?”

“Okay. Okay. Ready sir? Should I count?”

“No! Peter just do it!”

So he did and Tony couldn’t help the cry of pain it evoked and wished he’d thought to have something to bite down on. For a moment his thoughts were swept away in the waves of pain and he felt himself get light-headed, the room going fuzzy and dark, his body prickling like a limb when it falls asleep.

“Stay with me, Mr. Stark,” he heard Peter plead. He tried to stay conscious, fighting against the weakness and darkness that threatened him.

“Okay,” he agreed vaguely. He tried to rally his senses, pushing through. “I’ll stay, no problem, just cancel that marathon I was signed up for.”

He heard Peter give a laughing sob. 

“Hold pressure, Pete,” he said. “I’m just going to rest my eyes.” Peter seemed to know his own strength pretty well, Tony thought. He was pressing hard but for a kid that could easily snap his femur if he felt in the mood, he was surprisingly gentle. After several minutes of Peter keeping pressure, he spoke and it startled Tony out of his semi-consciousness.

“I think it’s slowed down the bleeding, Mr. Stark, like maybe you’re not losing as much. But it looks like you lost a lot of blood.” Tony could have told Peter that without looking; he felt weak enough to confirm it.

“Peter,” he said, his mouth feeling filled with cotton. “Remember those water bottles at the table? Were there some left? Can you get us water?”

“But what happens if I let go the pressure?”

Tony tried to sit up enough to hold pressure himself, but the pain from the bar in his abdomen spiked and quickly laid back down, panting. “It will be okay for a minute, but we both need a drink.” Peter hesitated. He didn’t want to leave and he didn’t want to see Jacob and Elizabeth Warner’s dead bodies either but he knew Tony was right.

“Should I take that out too?” he asked, nodding to the rebar.

“No, see how it’s not bleeding so much? It might start if we take the bar out, it’s likely pluggin the hole, unlike the shrapnel which made a tear.”

“How’d you learn so much about these kinds of injuries?”

“Here and there, Pete, how about that water?” Peter stood up and went quickly to see if he could get to the water bottles. Tony tried to breathe as best he could, though the injury made it difficult. He closed his eyes, remembering the months he spent in Gulmira after the Ten Rings was eradicated from there. While helping to rebuild it, he’d seen just about every kind of injury you could get from bombs, guns, and fire. In only the few months he’d spent figuring out how to equip a medical facility there, he’d learned more about it than he’d ever wanted. Turned out it came in handy again, he could only hope his info wasn’t outdated. 

Peter came back, skidding to a halt and twisting the cap off one of several water bottles he’d found. Tony tried again to sit up a bit but it was far to painful. Peter saw his trouble and moved around. “Rest your head on my leg, sir, and you won’t have to use your stomach muscles,” he suggested.

Tony complied, and though he still spilled some of the water, he took a long drink then rested a few minutes, having Peter drink too. 

“All right, Peter, the next part will be hard. I don’t like it, but I need you to do what I ask. You have to leave me here. I can’t walk like this. I need you to ge out and get some help.”

Peter didn’t argue, but he didn’t move. He sat there in silence and Tony didn’t say anything else, letting Peter think about it and process. The oppressive darkness pressed around them the air thick and close and still filled with dust. “If I leave you here, you’ll die,” Peter said finally.

“No, I won’t I’ll be fine with water and—“

“ _No._ Please, Mr. Stark, just listen to me. If I leave you here, you’ll die. I can’t explain how I know it, but I do. I know it.”

“Don’t you think you’re just being anxious? It would be completely normal. Come on, Pete, I know this has to be hard after what happened with the Vulture, don’t you think it’s that?”

“It’s not that,” Peter insisted. “I feel scared from that too, sir, but this is different. It’s like I can... like I can sense it or something.”

“We don’t have a lot of options here,” Tony reminded him.

“You’re right, we don’t, there’s only one option. I help you out of here. What’s the safest way?”

Tony sighed, debating with himself. Any chances Peter had of getting himself out of here on his own slimmed down to next to none trying to drag his injured, bleeding body along for the ride. But heroes gotta hero. And he thought about what Peter said; he seemed so sure. Peter was looking to him, hoping for his trust but he wasn't sure if he could really count on the judgment of a teenager; he was more apt to rely on his own judgment. Reluctantly he capitulated.

“Okay we can try, on one condition,” Tony said, his voice tight and short against the pain he was fighting. “If I pass out, done. You go without me and get help. You have to promise, Peter.”

“I promise, sir.”

“Also, if we get stuck somewhere because I can’t fit or crawl because of my injury, done. You got without me and get help. Promise me again.”

Peter hesitated but finally nodded. “I promise.”

“Okay. Now. This part is going to really suck. I’m going to need your help.”

Anxiously Peter moved around. “Try to stay relaxed, Mr. Stark, I can get you on your feet no problem, you don’t have to do any work.”

Tony nodded his understanding but when Peter grasped his hand Tony pulled against it, stopping him. “One second kid, just a second.” He had to gather his strength and courage against the pain he knew was coming. Puffing his cheeks with quick breaths he nodded to Peter to stand him up. 

It was a strong, quick, fluid lift but the pain was overwhelming. The darkness threatened again as his blood pressure dropped from the sudden change in position after losing so much blood. His leg wound felt like a brand of fire, searing pain, and the rebar was sharp, stabbing, insistent.

After a long several moment’s passed he realized Peter was holding him steady, keeping him balanced on one leg and taking nearly all his weight. He attempted to relive the burden on Peter a bit, but his tolerance to the pain was minimal. “I don’t know if I can do it Peter,” he said faintly. “I’m sorry kid, the pain—“

“Give it a minute, sir. Lean on me. I got you. I’m... I’m strong enough. I don’t mean to brag but you’re like lifting like, five grapes.”

Tony smiled faintly because he couldn’t laugh and supposed he could count his blessings that the 16-year-old wasn’t required to bridal carry him, which, now that he thought about it, was a distinct possibility. “At least the wounds are on the side,” Peter offered.

“There’s that silver lining I was looking for,” Tony said drily. Keeping his right arm around Peter’s shoulder, he kept his left hand pressed around the bar; it provided a small relief to the pain movement causes and kept is slightly more stable. He looked around the dark room, Peter shining a light around. A small bomb in the right place had collapsed a large part of the room and presumably the building above it. Peter swallowed, realizing just how lucky they were to have survived.

Tony seemed to be following a similar stream of thoughts. 

“Sorry, Peter, I never should have brought you into this. I should have realized there would be danger.”

“I live for danger, sir. Or my middle name is danger. Or I laugh in the face of danger. There was no way you could have known we wouldn’t be safe.”

“I could have and and should have, but it’s too late now. All right. That way,” he said nodding to the direction he wanted to take. “Let’s see how this goes.”

It went not great. Peter could see from the get go this was going to be hard, maybe too hard. Mr. Stark’s injured leg was basically useless and he could feel him leaning on him more and more as he weakened. They moved forward a few yards at a time, finding the route that was least likely to collapse further and moving things as best he could. Mr. Stark was sagged against him so much that a couple of times he looked to make sure he was still conscious. Peter could smell the blood, he could see that the wound was still bleeding, though more insidiously than earlier. His strength was not challenged by Mr. Stark’s weight but it was difficult to move things one handed, it was simply hard to get a grip on anything.

They had not gone far before Tony called a halt. “We tried Peter, but you got to go ahead without me. I’m sorry, I really am. I’m just... not as strong as you.”

An unexpected lump rose in Peter’s throat at the subtle words of praise, a dark feeling of fear accompanying it that Tony was hinting he wouldn’t make it. He tried to attune his senses to listen for Tony’s heartbeat, but they were still deadened from the explosion earlier. Peter could make a pretty educated guess though. “We can keep going.”

“We can’t. _I_ can’t, wish I could. I wanted to help you find a way out of this, a way forward. But I can’t be with you.”

“But you are strong, Mr. Stark!” Peter protested, trying to keep the pleading note out of his voice. “You’re strong enough if I help you, we _can_ do it together.”

“Kid, listen. I know you’re afraid, but I also you know you will find a way. It’s what you’ve always done and what you’ll have to do in the future if there ever comes a time I can’t be with you. For now and any future time, just know if I could find a way to be with you, I would have. But it’s okay to go forward with me. I’ll wait here. Go get us some help.”

Peter wanted to cry with frustration. He did not want to go against what Mr. Stark wanted after he said such kind things, but he knew, _he knew_ if he left him behind he would die. And there was no _way_ he was going to let that happen.

“Mr. Stark, you remember how after I messed up after the ferry...?”

“Yeah, of course I do, and how well you acquitted yourself after,” Tony said, pressing his hand to his side and looking at Peter keenly. 

“The hardest part about that was not only that people were put in danger when I was trying to help, but also I felt like I lost your trust.” Peter wiped the sweat off his brow. It was difficult for him to come clean about his feelings, it was embarrassing and hard to articulate. If he didn’t think Mr. Stark would probably die if he didn’t convince him, he wouldn’t have been able to say it.

“I do trust you!” Tony said, which is what Peter had hoped he’d say.

“Please Mr. Stark. After everything, if you could please just trust me on this. We gotta keep going, you can’t stay here.”

Tony looked up at him with anguish and pain. “Pete, it’s not that I don’t want to, _I can’t_ —“

“But I can, sir. I got you. It’s hard, but it’s not impossible. Come on, let’s go,” he urged. Tony gave him a hard, searching look, his face dirty and bleeding and bruised as Peter’s no doubt was. He made an obvious effort and gave a short nod. Peter picked him up and they tried again.

...

They had made some good, though painstaking progress, when they were brought up short by a slow, low rumble of vibration. The tremor started then continued, getting louder and shaking harder.

“What is that?” Peter asked, afraid, having just picked Tony up after laying him down while he moved a piece of debris. 

“That’d be the building collapsing. Go, go forward—“ 

Peter complied automatically and quickly, pulling hard on Tony to move fast enough, and they went into the space Peter had just cleared and around the remains of a partially collapsed wall, just as the rumbling reached them.They listened in fear to the sounds of the space they had just exited collapsing on itself and knowing they couldn’t move out of the way or do anything about it if where they were standing was next. It seemed to take an age, but eventually the rumbling stopped and they were still safe in their little pocket.

The two of them were in the pitch black dark. Luckily, Tony had held the phone’s flashlight up for Peter while he had moved things and hadn’t handed it back. He almost certainly would have dropped it in his haste and then they’d really be in trouble. There was no light for their eyes to adjust to; it was that dark. Tony fumbled to turn the flashlight back on, illuminating their small space. “Put me down,” Mr. Stark said faintly. Peter complied, easing his mentor down.

“Are you okay?”

“Not remotely. Think I’m going to pass out on you here in a minute. Do you think the building about to collapse was what was bugging you? Can you go on without me now?”

The fact that Mr. Stark had recognized Peter’s insistence that they move was more than just his anxiety when Peter hadn’t clearly been aware of it made Peter’s already tender feelings hurt somehow. He thought a moment. 

“I don’t feel as worried about leaving you now,” he admitted. “But we lost the water, and there’s only one light. We’d better stay together.”

“I think our little adventure moved us from slow and steady to sprint,” Tony said, moving his hand. The bar had become dislodged in the rush to move and it was bleeding pretty bad. Tony pulled it the rest of the way out and pressed his hand against the hole, a messy spiderweb of blood trailing between his fingers. Tony looked up a Peter, breathing out hard, once. “Go. Be fast. Be as safe as you can.” Then he lay back and promptly passed out. 

Peter felt a stab of fear and debated a brief moment; he could try and carry Tony the rest of the way, and he thought they had to be close to the exit soon. He tried to get some pressure against the bleeding wound, but he was scared by how pale and waxy Mr. Stark’s face had become. He didn’t linger.

It was much faster without Tony, clearing a path. It was probably only another ten minutes or so before he heard the sounds of other people digging toward him. “Here!” he yelled as loud as he could. He grabbed a piece of metal and started banging against an exposed pipe. “I’m here! Here!” 

He stopped after a few seconds to listen for a response. “We hear you, keep banging!”

He did as instructed while still moving some of the larger chunks of concrete where he could while he could. A piece of rubble gave way in front of him and he saw a gloved hand appear, knocking away more debris, then a head appeared with a hardhat and light on it, obscuring its wearer’s face. “Are you injured?”

Peter glanced down. There was a wound he’d been ignoring, a large tear in his bicep. “A little... Mr. Stark is hurt though, bad, needs immediate medical attention!”

“He’s alive?” the man asked to confirm.

“He was a few minutes ago but he was bleeding pretty bad.” 

Things moved quickly after that. A few minutes more work to widen their escape route and Peter led them quickly to Mr. Stark. He was still unconscious and Peter had the disconcerting sight of seeing him completely limp and unmoving as they put on on a small, foldable gurney and strapped him in to move him. There was a pool of blood on the ground under both wounds when they moved him. 

“Any other survivors?” one of the search and rescue guys asked him as they finally emerged from the rubble. Peter blinked, taking in the sight of what seemed like hundreds of police and rescue vehicles.

“We didn’t see anyone else alive, three people died.” Telling him made it feel real and a painful lump rose in his throat. The man put a hand on his shoulder. 

“That’s everyone accounted for. Come on, let’s get you to the hospital.”

“Who did this? Why?” Peter asked as he allowed himself to be led. Mr. Stark was already being loaded up and he watched the doors close and the sirens started.

The man studied him as if debating how much to disclose to him. “The investigation is ongoing, of course, so take this with a grain of salt. But the person who claimed responsibility is in custody, he said he did it because the US shouldn’t have signed the Sokovia Accords and the Avengers are a foreign terrorist operation.”

“How’d he figure that?” Peter asked, bewildered. 

“I can’t say I understand it but he said the Avenger’s sold out and are just mercenaries for the highest bidder now. He specifically targeted Tony Stark as the leader of the Avengers and blamed him for the Accords.”

“Are there... are there more of these people?” Peter asked, wondering if the threat to Mr. Stark was over even though the man had been arrested.

The man shrugged apologetically. “I don’t know everything about it yet, but from what the detective said he was part of some kind of organized group. But we’re working on rounding them up,” he assured him.

Peter sighed, feeling very tired. “I think I’d like to call my aunt now.”

...

Peter had a little bit of trouble getting out of observation overnight after he’d received stitches for the injury in his arm and being thrown so violently against the wall. The ED doctor was insistent he should be monitored but they would have a difficult time explaining how miraculously he was healing and in the end, May talked the doctor into letting him come up, with a follow-up appointment already scheduled for the next morning.

He’d been asking the ED doctor for news on Tony; he knew Mr. Stark was in the same ED in a different room. The doctor was reluctant to disclose how Mr. Stark was doing. "There are privacy laws," the doctor reminded him.

“Please, please,” Peter begged. “Just tell me if he’s all right, I was right there with him, I already know what his injuries are, all you’re telling me is if he’s okay or-- or not!”

The doctor relented. “They’re working on it. He wasn’t stable enough for surgery when he arrived and they are working hard to get him to that point. They got his bleeding under control and are giving him blood now.”

That didn’t sound very reassuring. “Can I see him?” He could already see the doctor ready to tell him no. “To say goodbye. If anything happens to him.”

The doctor looked to May who looked just as pleading, realizing he didn't have much of a chance against them. "I'll go ask Ms. Potts and the nurse caring for him if it would be all right. Sit tight a minute and try to drink a bit more fluids, young man."

"Thank you, sir."

...

As much as Peter wanted to be a strong young adult who was mature enough to not be frazzled by such mundane matters, going into the trauma bay was, well, traumatic. There were bloody equipment and bandages and other medical supplies as if the nurses, doctors, and techs didn't have enough time to be tidy, which they didn't. The nurse looked very stern. "We're transferring him to the ICU in ten minutes, young man, until he's stable enough for surgery. I know you need to see him but we need to take care of him, so be observant of our rules. Ten minutes." Intimidated, Peter nodded quickly. 

Ms. Potts came over and embraced Peter in a tight hug. Stunned as this was one of only a handful of times he'd met Ms. Potts, he awkwardly returned her embrace. After a moment and she was still hugging him, he relaxed a little and gave her a real hug back. She drew away, her cheeks wet. 

"Tony told me what happened. I'm so sorry, Peter, that you went through that, and thank you for helping Mr. Stark to safety. I'm very thankful."

May approved of this and held her arms out to embrace Pepper as well. "We'll give you two a minute," May said. "Come on, Pepper, let's grab some coffee for you, how you holding up?"

Tony had been patched up but not cleaned up much; they were too busy saving his life. He looked rather worse for the wear. Even with the blood they’d given him, he was still unnervingly pale and a little gray around the lips, even with the oxygen they had placed. "Peter. Hell, kid, the doctor told me you were injured, why didn't you say something? Come here, let me see it!"

"Oh, sure, they won't tell me anything but they tell you all about _my_ injuries," Peter protested as he complied, showing Tony his stitches.

"You don't look so good kid, maybe you should stay at the Compound tonight in case you need medical," Tony replied fretfully, scanning Peter's pale and anxious face.

“That’s really nice of you Mr. Stark but I think Aunt May would rather take me home, you know? She’ll take good care of me.”

“She will, better than I have,” Tony said, grabbing Peter’s wrist to get a closer look at his injury. He winced. “I’m sorry Pete. You said no to the Avengers, for good reason. I didn’t want you to think I dumped you when you said no, but I see now I should... I should back off. I can help with the tech and whatnot, but... I think it’s time for your ‘internship’ to end. I can’t put you though this. This was outside your ‘neighborhood’ duties.”

“It was. It was outside that, Mr. Stark, but... please don’t say that, sir. If I hadn’t been there and you died, it would have been like with Uncle Ben. And it was hard to see that guy die, but I was there and he didn’t have to be alone. I couldn’t save him,” his voice shook on the words, “but it counts for something I was there. Didn’t it? Wasn’t that something, Mr. Stark?” 

“Yeah, Pete, it was. And sometimes just seeing people who are afraid and helping them when we can’t save them is the most we can do. But you’re pretty young for it. It’s a burden.”

“But. Maybe it’s one I don’t mind living with. It does hurt, but the alternative would be harder to live with.”

“Careful with that, Peter,” Tony murmured, closing his eyes briefly. “But I understand. Better than you could ever know, I understand. We’ll talk about it more later, okay? After we rest up a bit, recover.”

“Yes, sir. They said you’re going into surgery soon.”

“That’s the plan.”

“If anything happens.” Peter hated the tremor in his voice, felt embarrassed and stupid, but Mr. Stark reached out and grabbed his wrist again.

“I think I can safely promise you I’ll be fine. All right? Try not to worry. I’ll make sure you’re notified first thing when I’m done. In the meantime, if you can promise to get some rest, I’ll feel better and worry less too.”

“I do promise Mr. Stark.” Peter glanced at his watch. “I don’t want to upset the nurse. But do you think we’re there?”

“Where?” Tony asked, his brow furrowed in confusion.

“Hug?” He was mostly joking and got a rewarding smirk from Mr. Stark but as he’d hoped, Tony did lean forward and give him an embrace. He didn’t smell as nice as Ms. Potts, but it was still a good hug.

“Bye, Mr. Stark. Take care.”

“You too, Pete.”

**Author's Note:**

> In the state I call home there are a small but vocal number of people sounding the alarm that quarantine and wearing masks is infringing on their LIBERTIES and I can imagine if there really were such a document as the Sokovian Accords, there would be people who took the restrictions as evidence of unacceptable government interference, especially hard to accept with a bunch of FOREIGN governments saying "no" to American heroes.


End file.
